wa[i](n)/n/[t](t)ing

there is a peculiar sadness of your citrus dessert

but i know not what it could be as i shuffle (everyday

i'm shufflin') and pander to my prescription life.

i'm following your directions to the letter of the

ignoble law; and the passions of my heart churn

beneath my scarcely-kept image of compliance.

if death visits so many a year at the gnawing gnashing

teeth of a surly hippopotamus, how many sinners

does it take to notice my paradoxical penitence?

and if the meditations of my heart are less than

honorable--if i was a brutus in disguise--would you

see in me the festering wound of an intrinsic ill?

it isn't what makes you happy--no it really doesn't

make me happy. but the time of the metal swingset

pulls me back into childlike acceptance of this life.

oh to grace, how great a debtor

it's all in the ticks and implications of his eyes

that whisper there might be something wrong.

we've never been so close, and yet she's filling my

heart with considerable sadness --this can't be right.

a simple act of flattery became the all-consuming

silver key and now your simple acts of gratitude

lock glowing shackles around your knees--i can't

bear this. this is a burden i cannot bear.

the words we spoke only hinted at the malady of

your heart and soul--if he could play you 'heart and

soul,' maybe he would treat yours better--i soak them

up and they fall from my eyes as a torrential rain.

this isn't what you were made for--these careless

caresses followed by the still and lonely quiet that

breeds insecurity behind the temporary surety of

your attended yet anxious heart of hearts.

and what hurts the most/ is being so close and hearing

those biting words.. that I cannot understand--no, not from

this lofty perch of perfection.. how could i understand

the groanings of your heart that mirror my own?

we sit, by and by, each of us, with holes in our hearts.

and day by day, we crumble a little more for the reassurance

that will dispel our universal infirmities with a well-placed kiss.

is this enough? are his silk words enough for you?

i want that your heart would be fortified and that

you could only see...

sick/lick/call concave contentment

the hot glass of my eyes is carving

the hills and valleys of my cheekbones

short of breath between my words,

flustered, i am the irritation in the shells.

listening to the sea, is such a small

absolution; the mariner and his tale

are hiding inside him, even as the

birds circle above. i am a dying radio

signal that casts about for an understanding.

your cough in the dark was unsettling.

the night terror is folded into my cells--

inevitably never tasted so much a cold metal

but a dense, lukewarm bile that wracks my

lungs with your contagion of distrust.

the recurrence is a pox upon my house,

the fence has been ransacked by the wildfire.

a sudden heaviness is all i have to show for my

nonsensical hope of what we could have been.

have i created my own reality? i should have been

a luminous angler, shuffling the lonely seafloor

collecting the remorse of the nations.

abysmal social poverty

i wanted to be right as rain even

when the wildfires pulled the earth

from seam to seam: even when your

houses went up in flames and the candles

didn't burn but melted piteously into

their pools of oil and wax.

i told you once of a time when the lonelies

crept into my aching bones and my head

was filled with the sadness that falls

like a damp black curtain... even the

country peach passion of a steaming cup

of tea wasn't the remedy for the somber

hued silence.

and here is a question for this age and the one we

can only find behind our shoulders-- is the patter

on the ridged tin roof enough to keep you company

when your lights go out and your books end

with a final punctual whisper?

is it the salve for your blistered arms when

you fall asleep in the blinding whiteness of

the cruel summer sunlight? and no one bothers

to wake your slumbering self or at least put

the sunscreen in your resting hands?

is there a simple solution to the absence i feel

in this abscess--this abyss. abysmal... amiss.

i'm sorely incomplete in this thunderless

rainstorm--the silence, oppresses and represses

my cries.. but my tears mingle with the rain

and i can hide behind the weather once again.